Today’s message summary of November 19, 2017 from Assistant Pastor Travis Jackson:
Psalm 100:1-5
Let the whole earth shout triumphantly to God!
Serve the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.
Acknowledge that the Lord is God.
He made us, and we are his—
his people, the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him and bless his name.
For the Lord is good, and his faithful love endures forever;
his faithfulness, through all generations.
Psalm 100 is very simple to understand. It is the shortest psalm in the Bible and very memorable. It is sung during several worship services. If you have attended a Reformed Presbyterian church, you would have heard this presented as part of a doxology.
Take notice of the title of Psalm 100. It is written as a psalm of Thanksgiving. It is also referred to as a psalm of giving praise. Both references are correct. Giving thanks is a way of showing appreciation to God for what He has done. It is an act of worship.
Psalm 100 has two parts. The first three verses acknowledge God for who He is, and the last two verses worship Him.
The first command in the psalm is in verse 2, where you are asked to serve Him. In verse 3, we are two know who He is, and is verse 4, we are to give thanks to Him. The psalm was written for public worship. In Jesus’s time, the people would have read this psalm within the synagogue. The people would publicly assemble to come together in a unified presence to praise God. It was to be done with exuberance. It is an invitation to come together with excitement!
Everyone, throughout the world, was invited to worship and praise Him. It was not a song relegated to the Jews. People were to shout to Him with gladness! If you can picture everyone coming together to recognize a king or queen, you can imagine the crowd forming and celebrating loudly. Thousands and thousands of churches are all worshiping right now in this manner. There is certainly nothing wrong with making a joyful noise unto the Lord!
This praise was (and is) to be a praise of reverence. While the physical buildings that existed from the days of Jesus and the Old Testament, we are now able to worship the Lord through our own bodies. Jesus declared that our own bodies are temples before Him. God deserves all praises from mankind and for all of creation.
Luke 19:40
He (Jesus) answered, “I tell you, if they were to keep silent, the stones would cry out!”
Note that Psalm 95 has a similar approach to Psalm 100:
Psalm 95:1-7
Come, let us shout joyfully to the Lord,
shout triumphantly to the rock of our salvation!
Let us enter his presence with thanksgiving;
let us shout triumphantly to him in song.
For the Lord is a great God,
a great King above all gods.
The depths of the earth are in his hand,
and the mountain peaks are his.
The sea is his; he made it.
His hands formed the dry land.
Come, let us worship and bow down;
let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.
For he is our God,
and we are the people of his pasture,
the sheep under his care.
Today, if you hear his voice.
The first command in Psalm 100 is to serve…as in serve the Lord (Psalm 100:2).
The word “serve” describes the act of working or worshiping as a slave before God. Being a slave for God implies ownership (not in the negative sense of slavery within US history). God is to be feared as our Master.
Colossians 3:22
Slaves, obey your human masters in everything. Don’t work only while being watched, as people-pleasers, but work wholeheartedly, fearing the Lord.
When you note that we are servants of God, it means that there is a reverence for Him. In the same way that servants have masters, God does not want His true servants to do what they want to do. Because we are in the flesh, we are to remain obedient to the Lord because it is in our best interest. When we serve Him, we are to do so with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12).
Psalm 2:10-12
So now, kings, be wise;
receive instruction, you judges of the earth.
Serve the Lord with reverential awe
and rejoice with trembling.
Pay homage to the Son or he will be angry
and you will perish in your rebellion,
for his anger may ignite at any moment.
All who take refuge in him are happy.
When we serve the Lord, we are being obedient to Him, and we are doing so with gladness.
The epitome of Sunday service worship is summarized in Psalm 100:2. We came and gathered in this building, and into His presence to worship Him. The building itself is physical and could disappear tomorrow, but we could still gather as a group without the building and worship Him as members of the body of Christ.
The reverence and holiness of God is to be taken into account:
Exodus 20:18-21
All the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain surrounded by smoke. When the people saw it they trembled and stood at a distance. “You speak to us, and we will listen,” they said to Moses, “but don’t let God speak to us, or we will die.”
Moses responded to the people, “Don’t be afraid, for God has come to test you, so that you will fear him and will not sin.” And the people remained standing at a distance as Moses approached the total darkness where God was.
It is to remind us to not sin against the Lord. Whether we are gathered in a group or even praying and meditating alone before Him, we are to keep the fear of the Lord on our hearts. Your understanding of who the Lord is will help to dictate your own behavior. Those who have little to no fear of Him will often only live for themselves.
Be mindful that when you serve the Lord, your service is an act of worship. Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ voluntarily and willing perform this service. Please note, however, that such service without reverence and faith is meaningless.
The second command in Psalm 100 (verse 3) is to know the Lord.
Knowing the Lord is also referred to throughout the book of Ezekiel and in many parts of the Old Testament. To know the Lord is to take the time to learn about who He is. It helps you to learn about how to not sin against Him, and He encourages you to be obedient to Him.
Psalm 100:3-4
Acknowledge that the Lord is God.
He made us, and we are his—
his people, the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him and bless his name.
Getting to know who He is puts the focus on Him. When we take our focus off of Him, that it when things start to slip. If your focus is on the glory of God–and of Christ, then your desire should be to learn more about Him each and every day.
Romans 9:20-21
But who are you, a mere man, to talk back to God? Will what is formed say to the one who formed it, “Why did you make me like this?” Or has the potter no right over the clay, to make from the same lump one piece of pottery for honor and another for dishonor?
The God of the universe is indeed the Potter, and He has created everything. His love and His holiness cannot be contained because that is the essence of who He is.
The third command is to give thanks to the Lord (Psalm 100:4). Note that giving thanks to the Lord is not just relegated to the Thanksgiving holiday. It is far more than that. Giving thanks to the Lord is an act of worship, and that is to be done throughout the entire year. It is an act of worship that others in your life should readily see—and wonder.
Giving thanks is not just about having something like food or possessions. We give thanks to the Lord because of His goodness. If a person who has nothing can still give thanks to God for who He is, then they understand the character and nature of a holy and righteous God. One’s circumstances may change, but the nature of God never changes.
Psalm 100:5
For Yahweh is good, and His love is eternal; His faithfulness endures through all generations.
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